Ludovic de Danne, European Affairs Adviser for the leader of the French right-wing party Front National Marine Le Pen, said that Marine Le Pen could become number one in the presidential elections, if the National Front party gains 7 million voters.
French departmental elections showed that the National Front party could gain a record number of votes in the presidential elections, possibly making Marine Le Pen the next French president, European Affairs Adviser for the leader of the French right-wing party Front National Marine Le Pen, told Sputnik Monday.
“More than 5 million voters for National Front – it has never happened before, it’s unprecedented! If we could keep this kind of figures, Marine Le Pen will have the chance to reach 7 to 8 million voters for president’s elections… In this situation Marine Le Pen could become number one,” Ludovic de Danne told Sputnik.
De Danne explained that Marine Le Pen’s chances are very high as the UMP alliance consists of several different parties and each of them will have to present their own candidate for the presidential elections whereas National Front has a single candidate.
“Sarkozy pretends to be a winner in these elections, but when it comes to the president’s elections it’s not going to work like this. The UMP alliance will have to separate and each party will have to have the candidate of its own. And they don’t have the chances against Marine Le Pen,” de Danne said.
Young French politician and Front National parliamentarian, Marion Maréchal-Le Pen, said that her colleagues from the centre-right UMP and Socialist Party “have organised French political impotence”. She was participating last night in a debate on the “War of the right-wing parties” on the talkshow “Les mots croisés” on France 2, the state-owned channel.
Marion Maréchal-Le Pen on last night’s programme
Maréchal-Le Pen went further and claimed, in a rare statement for a sitting parliamentarian and member of the National Assembly in her country, that “one may well ask oneself the question, whether politics still has the capacity to change things”. She blamed “successive transfers of sovereignty to Europe, as well as government by the judges of the European Court of Human Rights whose ultra-extensive jurisdiction takes precedence over internal law” for this state of affairs. Circulars from Brussels to governments constitute another source of power abuse as bureacrats dictate to politicians what to do in their home countries.
According to Marion Maréchal Le Pen, the centre-right UMP “has been an accomplice to all of that”, and regardless of their sympathies for the Gaullist tradition in France, she feels that the European issue has to be confronted as it affects “the power of politics and the maintenance of politics in France”.
France’s National Front party dealt a major blow to the ruling Socialists Sunday after several of its candidates took prime position in the first round of local elections.
According to preliminary results from the interior ministry, the UMP and allies took 47 percent of the vote nationwide while the Socialist party and allies took 38 percent, and the FN five percent — far higher than its 0.9 percent result in the first round of 2008 municipal polls.
Applauding what she said was “an exceptional vintage for the FN”, Marine Le Pen — head of the anti-immigration, anti-EU party — said the polls marked the “end of the bipolarisation of the political scene”.
Although the FN had been expected to do well, the first round results were far better than expected.
FN candidates came ahead in several key towns and cities that will put them in pole position in the second round on March 30.
In the former coal-mining town of Henin-Beaumont in northern France, Steve Briois went a step further and achieved 50.3 percent, an absolute majority which made him the outright winner and mayor.
Under municipal election rules in France, any candidate who gets more than 50 percent is declared the winner and there is no need for a second round.
The FN hopes to claim the mayorship of 10 to 15 mid-sized town after the second round, and if it achieves that, it will have beaten its previous record in 1997 when it had four mayors.
The Socialists immediately responded to the surge of the FN by acknowledging that some voters had registered their discontent with current government policies.
“Some voters expressed their concerns, and even their doubts, by abstaining or through their vote,” Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said.
Turnout was dismally low at around 38 percent — a record for French municipal elections.
Ayrault called on voters to rally in the second round to block the “advance of the FN”, in a mirror of 2002 presidential elections when then FN leader Jean-Marie Le Pen reached the second round, prompting the Socialist Party to urge support for centre-right candidate Jacques Chirac.
“Where the National Front is in a situation where it could win the second round, all democratic and Republican forces have the responsibility to create the conditions to stop it from doing so,” he said.
The leader of the UMP party meanwhile called on those who had voted for the FN to “carry over their vote” onto UMP candidates in the second round.
Jean-Francois Cope predicted a “big victory” for his party in the second round, in a sign that corruption scandals that have affected the UMP as well as former president Nicolas Sarkozy had little impact.
In the French capital, the UMP was encouraged by an unexpected lead won by former Sarkozy minister Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet, who is competing against Anne Hidalgo, the daughter of Spanish immigrants, in a fierce battle that will see Paris get its first ever female mayor.
Hidalgo had largely been tipped as the favourite, but the results instead gave Kosciusko-Morizet a handy advantage going into the second round.
The mayorship of the French capital is the most high profile of municipal elections that will produce over 36,000 new mayors for villages, towns and cities across France.
And while very few of these will be from the FN, the Sunday results are a remarkable turnaround for a party that, at the time of the last municipals, was mired in financial crisis and internal bickering.
Le Pen took over the FN leadership in 2011 and set about broadening the appeal of a party regarded as taboo by many voters in light of her father’s repeated convictions for Holocaust denial and inciting racial hatred.
As well as trying to “detoxify” the FN’s image, she has attempted to make it less of a single-issue party by campaigning on unemployment, costs of living and crime.
Past FN attempts at running local councils have often failed as a result of the eccentric personalities involved, but Le Pen has been eager to show that the party is capable of prudent governance.
“We want to become apparent as a big local political force,” Le Pen said Sunday.
Source: Yahoo
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. Cookie settingsACCEPT
Privacy & Cookies Policy
Privacy Overview
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
